Fed: Jungle crash site slowly gives up its secrets

AAP General News (Australia)
04-23-2009
Fed: Jungle crash site slowly gives up its secrets

By Max Blenkin, Defence Correspondent

CANBERRA, April 23 AAP - Slowly, ever so slowly, a remote patch of jungle in Vietnam
is giving up its secrets.

But it remains to be seen if the fates of the last two Australian servicemen missing
in action in the country will be among them.

It's just over a week since an Australian Defence Force team trekked seven hours through
thick jungle to find the final resting place of lost RAAF Canberra bomber A84-231.

The plane has lain on a remote hillside in Quang Nam province, near the border with
Laos, since 1970. Its remains have been picked over by villagers, and removable objects
have been scavenged.

But undeniable evidence remains - the Rolls Royce engines that took the plane on its
final bombing run, and a crumpled membership badge for the "Phan Rang Ugly Club".

Phan Rang was the bomber's home base and the technicians there took a warped sense
of pride in their reputation as the ugliest blokes in the air force.

So far, no human remains have been found at the site, but the families of Flying Officer
Michael Herbert and Pilot Officer Robert Carver are being kept informed of developments.

The next step will be a full archaeological excavation that could finally end the mystery
about what happened to the last two Aussie servicemen listed as missing in action in Vietnam.

North Vietnamese forces deny shooting the aircraft down. And weather conditions in
the area at the time were fine and clear.

An early theory was that one of the aircraft's bombs failed to release and detonated
a short time later.

But the crash scene has already put that theory to bed - had things happened that way
the aircraft's wreckage would spread over a far larger area.

Defence force head investigator Major Jack Thurgar has spoken extensively with former
North Vietnamese commanders and combatants who served in the area at the time the aircraft
disappeared.

"They did not claim at any time ever to have shot the aircraft down," he said.

They also denied having ever located any downed Australian airmen - dead or alive.

There's some evidence that the men were unlikely to have safely ejected from their
doomed bomber - the crash site is strewn with small pieces of perspex, likely from the
aircraft's canopy.

"It would appear that the canopy was intact when the aircraft crashed. The physical
evidence is that they did not eject," Major Thurgar said.

The wreckage lies on a 60-degree slope, two-thirds of the way up a mountain, covering
an area 500 metres by 200 metres.

Modelling conducted by the Defence Science and Technology Organisation had suggested
a possible search area based on the bomber's course and final reported location.

But critical information came from Vietnamese villagers, thanks to the goodwill generated
by Australian aid programs.

"That aid work has ensured that Australia has a good name within the province," Major
Thurgar said.

Villagers were able to point to various local crash sites. Most were American but there
was one whose origin was unknown.

When officers Herbert and Carve vanished on November 3, 1970, they'd just carried out
a bombing mission. They were returning to base when their bomber disappeared from radar
screens about 65km southwest of Da Nang.

The mission had been directed at the North Vietnamese 44 Front headquarters on the
Ho Chi Minh trail, which appears to have been pinpointed after US electronic listening
posts intercepted radio signals.

They missed by about 300 metres.

AAP mb/tnf/cdh

KEYWORD: BOMBER

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